Tests confirm NY professor contracted hantavirus

Lab tests have confirmed that a New York professor contracted the potentially deadly hantavirus during a hiking trip in the Adirondacks.

A spokeswoman for Stony Brook University on Long Island said Monday the results were confirmed late last week. Doctors suspected the university professor contracted the disease after an August camping trip.

Lab results confirming the diagnosis were sent to the state health department and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The professor has since recovered.

He was bitten by an animal while camping near Mount Marcy in northern New York. Doctors say it is unlikely the bite was the direct cause. But it confirmed the presence of rodents, which can carry the disease.

Nine visitors at California's Yosemite National Park this summer became infected with hantavirus. Three later died.

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